Authors: Josh Lanyon
Stranger Things Have Happened: An Adrien English Write Your Own Damn Story (The Adrien English Mysteries) (8 page)
It’s funny that the smile seems to start in your chest and work its way muscle by muscle to your face. You can feel that smile coming long before it curves your mouth, and you say gravely, “But?”
“He won’t feel a fraction of what I do for you. You won’t change his life. And you will always wonder about what could have been, always feel that funny little ache right here.” He puts his hand over your heart.
You feel that touch right through your shirt. Feel the warmth of his tenderness, the weight of his possession.
You put your hand over his, and he captures it. You smile. Does he realize you’re holding hands? Maybe he does, because he raises your clasped hands, and gives your knuckles a quick kiss. Not a smooth move, not a practiced move, but if you wanted smooth and practiced, you’d stay in this office with the fake Maltese falcon in the foyer and the Bombay Company knock-off furniture.
You let Jake lead the way out of the office, down the stairs, and back to the busy street below.
Y
ou’re very fond of your dear old mum, but there’s no denying these little get-togethers are hard on your nerves.
Your mother breaks the news to you that yet another of your old high school friends died recently. Rusty Corday fell out of a high rise hotel in Buffalo.
When you return to Cloak and Dagger Books, Angus informs you that you just missed the police. Or, more exactly, Detective Riordan.
Weirdly, you’re not sure if that’s a relief or a disappointment.
Angus also lets you know that flowers were delivered for you earlier in the afternoon.
The flowers are in one of those long white florist boxes. You’ve never had flowers sent to you before, and you could have done without these. Black hollyhocks and a dozen blood-red roses, perfect to the last thorn, seem a little on the macabre side.
There’s a card though no signature.
Nothing to him falls early, or too late…
You bin the flowers only to find Angus lurking behind you in the kitchen. He tells you Claude has been trying to reach you all day.
You call Claude who immediately launches into a tirade about how you led the police straight to him. Once you calm him down, he begins to talk about Robert, and what he has to say is not reassuring. As much as you hate to believe it, Claude sounds like he had a pretty strong motive for killing Robert.
But Claude also points out that Robert wasn’t the most tactful or sensitive of souls, and he made a lot of enemies. That’s true. You knew Robert a long time. You practically grew up together. Feeling a little nostalgic, you dig out your own yearbook and flip through the pages of youthful faces.
Angus calls you to the phone, but when you pick up, there’s no one there.
Is it just me or is a lot of stuff happening to you all at once?
Anyway, you’re having cereal for dinner because you are one Lonely Guy, when Detective Riordan shows up unannounced.
__________
If you decide to let Jake in, click here
F
ive minutes later, after proceeding along an inclined gallery that winds ever upward, you’re ushered into a vast vaulted chamber lit with a thousand phosphorescent lamps and gleaming with idols of gold and silver, jewels flashing from their eyes.
High in the dome hangs a great golden disc, representing the sun. At the far end, above a marble altar, coils a dragon with tusks of ivory and scales of jade, its eyes two lustrous pearls. And all about the room throng priests in fantastic head-dress and long white robes, woven through elaborately with threads of yellow and green.
At the appearance of the captives — that would be you and Professor James Riordan — a murmur like a chant rises in the still air. Someone touches a brand to the altar and there is a flash of flame followed by a thin column of smoke that spirals slowly upward.
Now one of the priests steps out — the supreme one among them, to judge from the magnificence of his robe — and addresses you, speaking slowly, rhythmically.
As his strange, sonorous discourse continues, Professor Riordan grows visibly perturbed. His blond beard twitches and he shifts uneasily on his feet.
Finally the discourse ceases and the professor replies to it, briefly. He turns his grave, tawny eyes on you.
“What is it?” you ask quietly. “What did the priest say?”
He considers, before replying.
“Naturally, I did not gather everything,” is his slow reply, “but I gleaned sufficient information to understand what is afoot. First, however, let me explain that the dragon you see over there embodies their deity Tlaloc, god of the sea. In more happy circumstances, it would be interesting to note that the name is identified with the Mayan god of the same element.”
He pauses, as though loath to go on, then continues, “At any rate, the Antillians have worshipped Tlaloc principally, since their sun god failed them. They believe he dragged down their empire in his mighty coils, through anger with them, and will raise it up again if appeased. Therefore they propose today to —”
A chill ripples down your spine. “Uh, that’s interesting.” You unobtrusively check how many rounds of ammo remain in your belt. “But does that mean what I think it does?”
“Not being a mind reader, I can’t be sure, however, if you surmise that we are about to be sacrificed to the dragon god of the Antillians, I concur.”
“Oh. Okay. Well, have you any brilliant ideas as to how we can get out of this jam, Professor?”
“Hey, this is all you,” Professor Riordan says, turning his bespectacled gaze your way. “You fell asleep doing paperwork and now you’re having another one of your kinky dreams. I’m just along for the ride.” He coughs politely into his fist. “My suggestion is you wake up and retrace your way back to the main storyline. I can assure you with some degree of confidence that this particular branch is not going to end well…”
Y
ou get a couple of beers and Detective Riordan sits down at your kitchen table. He reminds you that you’re supposed to be helping save your sorry ass by figuring out the connection between Hersey and that chess piece.
Well, you didn’t think this was a social call, right?
You suggest that Robert died at the hands of a serial killer, but Riordan brushes the idea off — even though he’s the one who brought the chess piece to your attention. And if a chess piece clutched in a dead man’s hand doesn’t seem like serial killer territory, you don’t know what does. Then again, you read a lot of mysteries. Riordan probably does not. It’s doubtful he knows how to read at all.
Which doesn’t change the fact that he’s a good-looking son of a bitch. And, while he does seem irrefutably straight, you can’t quite shake that sense that there’s some connection between you.
You do get him to finally admit he doesn’t think you killed Robert, and that means a lot since his partner, Chan, does think you did it. And most of the evidence, such as there is, points to you.
You remind Riordan that Robert had met someone new, that there was a new man in his life — a man no one seems to know anything about. “Find the guy Robert went to meet that night and I think you’ll nail whoever killed him.”
Riordan is not impressed. “Did you know Claude La Pierra, aka Humphrey Washington, has a juvenile arrest sheet as long as your arm?”
You did not know that.
Riordan has a second beer, you chat about murder and mayhem some more and then he gets up to leave.
__________
If you impulsively choose to ask Riordan to stay, click here
If you see Riordan to the door and then you trundle off to bed, click here
O
n Monday Tara shows up at the bookstore to give you Rob’s old high school yearbook. She says that Robert requested she send it to him a few weeks before his death. Surely that means
something
because Rob had a couple of old yearbooks at his apartment, which means he must be searching for something in particular? Something pertaining to a specific year?
Right after she leaves, Claude calls with some startling news.
“I saw him,
cherie
, last night at Ball and Chain.”
It takes you a few seconds to get the gist of it, but it turns out Claude has recognized Detective Riordan as a regular at a sex club called Ball and Chain.
“He was probably undercover or something.”
“No! You’re not listening to me. I’ve seen him there before. He’s a
member
.
He’s a
master
.”
Claude begins to babble about Robert visiting that same club sometimes, which — in Claude’s opinion — makes Riordan a suspect in Robert’s death. Claude seems to believe he can parlay this information to his own advantage, perhaps get Riordan thrown off the case or, better still, blackmail Riordan into backing off in his investigation. You may not be an expert on human nature, but even you can tell Riordan is not the backing off kind.
You try and explain this to Claude, but he misreads your concern for him as concern for Detective Riordan. Which is just…weird. You don’t even like Riordan. At least, you don’t think so. He’s kind of a hard person to like, seeing that he thinks you’re capable of murder.
Claude hangs up on you, and no sooner do you replace the receiver than that reporter from
Boytimes,
Bruce Green, shows up and asks if he can buy you a cup of coffee.
You let Green know that you’ve done some checking and you’ve discovered he doesn’t actually work for
Boytimes
, but he explains that he’s a freelancer.
Which…well, that’s possible, after all.
__________
If you choose to go have coffee with Green, click here
If you suddenly feel like you need a nap, click here
Y
ou’re out of practice, so it isn’t smooth. “Look, you don’t have to leave. I mean, unless you do. But if you don’t have to be anywhere…I’d like you to stay.” You’re not even sure if that’s true. Except, strangely, it is. You feel some connection to Riordan. It’s crazy, but there’s something there.
But maybe it’s just on one side.
Riordan’s face changes, grows ugly, dangerous. “Stay? What, here? With
you
?”
He sounds appalled, but there’s a certain hungry glitter in his eyes. The heat rushes into your face, but you nod.
He says finally, slowly, “What do you think I am?”
“I…think you’re a man. Like me.”
He shoves you back, hard. You crash into the hall table, knocking it over, smashing the jar of old marbles you’ve collected through the years. Glass balls skip and bounce along the corridor. You land on your back, your head banging down on the hardwood floor.
From a distance you hear him saying, “I’m nothing like you!”
For a second or so you lie there, blinking up at the lighting fixture, taking in the years of dust and dead moths gathered in the etched-glass globe. The silence that follows is more startling than the collision of you and the table and the floor. You can hear Riordan’s harsh breathing and, from far away, a marble rolling away down the hall — dying into silence.
Riordan bends over you, and you knock his hands, rolling away and scrambling to your feet. You stay out of reach, watching him warily, waiting for him to launch himself at you again. Can you make it to the phone before he knocks you down again? You can’t take him, that’s for sure.
Riordan is still staring at you in that stricken, horrified way. In his eyes, you read fear, and with the fear, the urge to knock you down again, to punch, to kick, to silence, to destroy. His hands are clenched by his side. You feel light-headed with anger and outrage — and yeah, you’re scared too. He could probably kill you by accident. Or maybe it won’t be by accident. Your heart is tripping in your throat.
You can barely form the words without crying. From rage. “Get out.”
He swallows once, dryly. He looks sick. He opens his mouth, closes it.
You harden your voice. “I won’t tell you again. Get out.”
In the back of his too bright eyes, you see the thoughts flitting through his brain. If he leaves, if you report this assault, he might lose his job. Worse, it might provoke speculation into something he very much does not want anyone to speculate on. Ever. The very thing
you
speculated on.
He could shut you up for good. With one well-placed punch, he could probably solve the problem of you. He could claim you admitted to killing Robert and that you tried to jump him.
There is fear and desperation in his face. Riordan is right to be afraid because you don’t know yourself what you plan to do — if you live through the next two minutes.
The seconds pass. Your gaze never wavers from Riordan’s.
Then he goes, shutting the door quietly behind him.
__________
If you phone the police and report the assault, click here
If you decide to keep your mouth shut about the assault, click here
F
inally you decide that since you’re probably not going to live that long anyway, it’ll be less trouble for everyone if you just move in with your mother for however much time you have left.
Lisa hires an overpriced team of specialists to oversee your “recovery,” even though the possibility for actual recovery is nil. In addition to a night nurse, a masseur, and a physical therapist, she hires a day nurse by the name of Jean Paul.
Jean Paul is six foot three, French and totally gorgeous. He is a few years younger than you and professes to be a fan of your book, which is probably total bullshit, but one day when you’re in one of your rare pleasant moods, the two of you start talking about Georges Simenon and French mystery fiction, and it turns out that Jean Paul really
has
read your book.